Rosh Hashanah is of course a day of Malchuyot. אמרו לפני מלכויות כדי שתמליכוני עליכם. Hagam that that our minhag that we only have the full-blown bracha of Malchuyot in the Mussaf Shemoneh Esrei. The Ba'al HaMa'or is of the opinion that me'ikar hadin really was supposed to daven the nine brachot in each Shemoneh Esrei on Rosh Hashanah. Not our minhag. But hagam that our minhag is that we only have the full-blown Malchuyot with Aleinu, with the psukim in Mussaf, but Rav Chaim used to say that Malchuyot is the kedushat hayom of Rosh Hashanah. Nafka mina that if one omits the phrase מלך על כל הארץ in the chasima, so not only by Mussaf where the bracha of kedushat hayom is merged with Malchuyot, but even by Maariv, by Shacharit, by Mincha, by Kiddush, the phrase מלך על כל הארץ is me'akev: מלך על כל הארץ מקדש ישראל ויום הזיכרון. Malchuyot is the kedushat hayom of Rosh Hashanah. Rosh Hashanah is a day of Malchuyot. Me'idach gisa, בארבעה פרקים העולם נידון בראש השנה כל באי עולם עוברים לפניו כבני מרון.
Rosh Hashanah is also a Yom HaDin. Many many years ago I heard a shmuess from the Mashgiach in the Yeshiva of Staten Island where he explained something very very fundamental in terms of understanding Rosh Hashanah that these are not sort of two different independent themes or dimensions but rather that din is an aspect of Malchuyot. HaMelech HaMishpat. מלך במשפט יעמיד ארץ. One expression of Malchuyot is that the Melech is dan. Melech meimit umechayeh. Ad kan shamati. The truth is it's very meduyak in the famous Gemara in the fourth perek: אמר רבי אבהו אמרו מלאכי השרת לפני הקדוש ברוך הוא ריבונו של עולם מפני מה אין ישראל אומרים שירה לפניך בראש השנה וביום הכיפורים אמר להם אפשר מלך יושב על כיסא דין וספרי חיים וספרי מתים פתוחים לפניו וישראל אומרים שירה.
Din is an expression, an aspect of Malchuyot. Let's try to understand another aspect of the mitzvat hayom of Malchuyot. When Yosef recounts his dream to the brothers, so they respond: המלוך תמלוך עלינו אם משול תמשול בנו. There's a famous vort from the Gaon, but the Ibn Ezra already says it also. What's pshat in the pasuk? The difference, what's the difference between a Melech and a Moshel? A king and a ruler? A Moshel is someone who imposes his rule. Not with the—he's not welcomed, he's not embraced by his subjects, he imposes his rule. And that's what the brothers are saying to Yosef: המלוך תמלוך עלינו? It will never be with me. Do you think that it can ever come to pass that you'll be molech aleinu? That we will willingly, happily, enthusiastically embrace you as our melech even if אם משול תמשול בנו, even if somehow or other you'll be able to coerce and impose yourself on us, even if אם משול תמשול בנו, it will never be hamoloch timloch aleinu. So malchuyos means that the melech rules meritzonam hatov of the people. They welcome him, they elevate him, they embrace his malchus. Hakadosh Baruch Hu is moshel, that's a fact, that doesn't depend upon us. Our mitzvah on Rosh Hashanah is not simply to affirm that fact but to convert memshalah into malchus, that we joyfully, enthusiastically embrace the malchus. But how is that possible once we recognize that one element of malchuyos is the din? כי הוא נורא ואיום. מי יחיה ומי ימות. Din is something that in our minds we're aware that we're being subjected to. How does a person with joy embrace din? And yet din is an aspect of malchuyos and that's what malchuyos means. It doesn't just mean to acknowledge, to affirm a reality, it means to joyously בממליך הקדוש ברוך הוא, knowing full well that that also entails it's a day of מי יחיה ומי ימות. So, three possible perspectives. The main one is the third. The Rosh, as you recall at the end of Rosh Hashanah, discussing the question that goes back to the Gaonim, whether one should, whether one is allowed, whether one should not fast on Rosh Hashanah. ועוד הביא רבינו יואל ראיה מהירושלמי בפרק קמא דראש השנה. אמר רבי סימון כתיב כי מי גוי גדול. רבי חנניה ורבי יהושע. חד אמר איזה אומה כאומה זאת שיודעת אופיה של אלוהיה.
They know the in quotation marks the nature in quotation marks shel elokeha, of their God. בנוהג שבעולם אדם שיש לו דין, if a person's in the docket and he's being tried for possibly a capital charge, לובש שחורים ומתכסה שחורים ומגדל זקנו ואינו חותך צפורניו לפי שאינו יודע איך דינו יוצא. אבל ישראל אינן כן לובשים לבנים ומתעטפים לבנים ומגלחים זקנם וחותכים צפורניהם ואוכלים ושותים ושמחים בראש השנה לפי שיודעין שהקדוש ברוך הוא עושה להם נסים ומטה את דינם לכף זכות
v'korei. So that Yerushalmi is one kosov hashlishi, but the pshat is that the Yerushalmi is referring to the din harabbim, not necessarily to the din of every yachid. A second perspective: the Sefer Hachinuch writes in the ta'amei mitzva of Rosh Hashanah that it's a tremendous chesed that Hakadosh Baruch Hu is ma'amid us badin on Rosh Hashanah. The alternative to having din on Rosh Hashanah is that we'd only be nidon bishas misa. The amount rachmana litzlan of chata'im avonos upesha'im that would accumulate is not a welcome thought to entertain. And it's a chesed that the Ribbono Shel Olam holds us to account every year. It minimizes the din, it minimizes our liability, our culpability. Both of those are obviously emes veyatziv, but kemidomeh in terms of the question we posed, it's the third perspective which is the main one. Ein hachinami, one prominent feature of malchiyos is din, and אין הכי נמי יתכן that one has a tremendous eimas hadin, is not at all sure which way the din will go. But the avoda of malchiyos, rabbosai, is for a person to understand that it's not about me. The avoda of malchiyos, the real avoda of malchiyos, is for a person to transcend that powerful self-centeredness that we all experience to varying degrees but to some degree we all experience: a person is at the center of his own universe. The real avoda of malchiyos is to be so focused on the malchiyos that a person is not thinking about himself. He's not measuring the malchiyos by what are its implications for me. He's not measuring the malchiyos by what are its consequences for me. He's joining together with the tzibur to joyously המליך הקדוש ברוך הוא. That's the level of malchiyos to which we aspire on Rosh Hashanah. That's the level of malchiyos for which we strive, and ultimately that's the real kosov hashlishi which makes it possible to joyously embrace malchiyos, albeit that malchiyos implies and involves din. To joyously embrace Malchios, albeit that Malchios implies and involves that—that there is a Melech and that we are avadim. But the avodah of Tishrei is to move v'karveinu malkeinu l'avodasecha, to realize that Malchios is the greatest possible pleasure, it's the greatest possible joy, it's the greatest possible connection. And therefore we say v'hasheiv kohanim l'avodasam, v'Levi'im l'shiram u'l'zimram, and v'hasheiv Yisrael l'naveichem. We want the avodah back. We want the Beis Hamikdash back, because there is nothing more joyous than being an eved of Hashem.